


Horpyna's Prophecy

by waltzingbeauty



Category: Ogniem i Mieczem | With Fire and Sword (1999), Trylogia | The Trilogy - Henryk Sienkiewicz
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-29
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23910316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waltzingbeauty/pseuds/waltzingbeauty
Summary: Slightly altering Vladimir Nabokov's famous quote („You came into my life – not as one comes to visit... but as one comes to kingdom where all the rivers have been waiting for your reflection, all the roads, for your steps...“), I made a prophecy for Bohun.Also, I made Bohun call Jan "Laszek", instead of "Lach" - if I am not wrong, it is the diminutive version of the term. He does call him so in the Hungarian translation when they meet for the first time and I love it, because it reminds me of the Slovak word "láska" - meaning "love".I am new to the fandom, so be kind if I made a mistake or two :DDD Also, I gift this fic to @bachaboska and @LucyLovecraft. It was bachaboska's videos doing that I boarded this ship and LucyLovecraft spiced it up with ffs :DDDD
Relationships: Jurko Bohun/Jan Skrzetuski
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	Horpyna's Prophecy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bachaboska](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bachaboska/gifts), [LucyLovecraft](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LucyLovecraft/gifts).



Even long after Jan Skrzetuski married Helena, he couldn’t stop fearing Bohun’s rage.  
Yes, he had married her, but Jurko Bohun could come any day and snatch her away, claim her his. That man didn’t know any God, fear – heck, he might have not known the basic instinct known to man: the fear of death.  
One thing Skrzetuski didn’t get: how could Helena reject such a man? After knowing him from his childhood, where he must have been so different – how could Helena remain so painfully indifferent?  
She should have loved him at some point, at least as a passing fancy.  
Claiming that he is wicked and unworthy of love, she damned him for eternity. What a respectable man could he have been, only if he had her love! Wasn’t it a sin, to not love the sinner? A cardinal one at that!  
Even though religion teaches the beauty of the soul is important, the outer shell can compensate some ugliness of character. Jurko Bohun was as wicked, as he was handsome. Any sane woman would have given in by now.  
Jan liked pretty. He liked fancy clothes, charming smiles and faces that looked a bit too perfect to be considered human. Heck, if Jan Skrzetuski were born a woman, he would have given in to Bohun’s charms a long time ago, even if he had witnessed him murder a man or two!  
He could have slayed his whole family, his whole village or his whole nation - if that heartless man loved him like he loves Helena, like a dog loves its master… even if he had slaughtered the whole world, Jan would still let Bohun smear his victim’s blood all over him. There was no other man so passionate, whose feelings burnt more strongly than wildfire.  
Yet his desperate calls of woe remained unanswered.  
The audacity! Helena’s heart was numb and deaf towards such a man’s call.  
Jan Skrzetuski was a simple man, he could love only what he understood – and he didn’t understand Helena.  
On the contrary, he understood Jurko Bohun a tad too well. It was his tragedy and his curse.  
He recognized the sheepish look Bohun gave the young couple when he saw them kissing, hugging or snuggling as young spouses often do. Envy, jealousy and longing mixed altogether – it was the silent admiration of an inexperienced virgin towards the luckier people who got to perform acts of tenderness, no matter how big or small.  
Bohun’s inexperience was even worse than Longin’s, because Bohun’s vows of chastity would never been broken. Bohun had wanted only Helena, no other mistress – Skrzetuski has robbed him of her, thus damned him for a lifetime of solitude. A wolf without a mate, what a terrific sight!  
He could easily guess the reason of the wide grin that spread across Bohun’s face, when he caught him rejecting Helena’s embrace.  
Bohun was mocking him and himself at once. Jan got fed up with Helena’s love, while him: the poor Cossack, never got to receive even a breadcrumb of it.  
It was a tragedy and a comedy at once.  
Laying wake at night, Skrzetuski pondered: “Maybe it was wrong to marry Helena.”  
He met her after a long time of boredom, coming home from battle and therefore she seemed like the most beautiful woman in the world.  
But for him, there were many beauties before: Anna, Eva, Adelajda, Jadwiga – and for Bohun there was only one.  
Yet Helena was no hound or horse! He couldn’t simply give her back once his eyes got tired of looking at her, she was family now.  
But was he truly in the need of family? He wanted passion and romance and it was all over in the moment when he realised, kissing his sweet bride, his eyes couldn’t face Bohun’s anymore.  
He remembered that he initially favoured Helena because she needed protection and someone to care for her. But wasn‘t Jurko an orphan as well? A more miserable one at that, because if Helena had fragments of memories guiding her back to her deceased father's love, Bohun’s parents passing left the Cossack with nothing, a blank page.  
Helena always had things to turn to. Religion, faith and even other men, willing to marry her at any time for her picture-like face. If not Jan, there might have come others, Helena was an extraordinarily beautiful lass. But which woman would take Jurko for more than a passing fancy, a whirlwind?  
So where did all his strength and wish to live come from, if he had no one to live for? It meant that the poor devil still hoped, still yearned for that special someone to save him from the ultimate darkness that was attempting to engulf him for a while now.  
If someone was in a true need of family, it was Bohun… and he had snatched it from him.  
Whoever says that forbidden fruits taste the best, lies.  
Stolen fruits taste rotten.  
Jurko Bohun wasn’t a bad man – he was the worst! But those who he loved, he guarded greatly, with tremendous jealousy. He poured his heart out when he loved, his adoration was a well that never dried up.  
Skrzetuski’s love was a candle shining bright and then turning into a puddle of melted wax. It was quite shortlived.  
His want was fuelled solely by the long separation – spending his day-to-day life with Helena made him realise that all along he had pined for a stranger.  
And searching for the sign of Bohun’s wicked face amongst enemy’s troops, he caught himself doing it all over again.

***

Jan Skrzetuski desperately tried to think of ways to make up for his mistakes.  
There weren’t many, but when he finally felt like he created a plausible one, instead of sending a messenger after the Cossack ataman, he mounted his horse and went to greet the handsome devil himself.  
In the middle of the night, cutting across the vastness of steppe, with only wild animals for company, Skrzetuski learnt a valuable lesson about husaria horses.  
Even if they are insanely fast and can manage to gallop for longer distances than other cross breeds, like all mortals, they too have their limits.  
Until his horse tripped over his own legs from the exhaustion, he didn’t realise how much he had been torturing the poor beast. The beautiful, obedient animal, refused to get up as it were not a horse, but a mere stubborn mule.  
“Friend, don’t be offended! I’ll put away whip, see? I threw it.”  
And he pretended to toss it, because he couldn't throw it for real. If he wanted to get to Bohun as soon as possible, he might have still needed it - he just wanted to trick the tired creature into action.  
Unimpressed, the horse didn’t change its ways. Instead it remained resting on the cold ground. How refreshing it must have been after all that chase!  
“Sergiusz, you know I love you. Don’t let me down. I put all my faith into you, this is no time for rest. Get up!”  
His companion neighed in protest.  
Jan thought that he will lose his mind. All of the times, why today? Sergiusz, the quietest, most patient of all equines. If he had to pick a horse to ride to hell, it would be him. After all, he rode him to battles.  
Was it the doing of Bohun’s charm, some kind of dark magic?  
“You can’t do this to me, friend! I have places to go, people to see!”  
People can’t stay in one place for long. Especially Jurko Bohun was famous for not frequenting one locality over another (except maybe when it came to Rozlogi).  
How long would it take him to switch locations? And then, how on the earth would he find him?  
Helena always warned him that Bohun is like misfortune, he turns up when you least expect him, but he had doubted her. And he was right to do so.  
Meeting him there, Bohun’s eyes shining in the darkness, Jan considered himself blessed.  
“Who mutilated this poor soul? I could hear his cries for help over miles away,” asked the proud Cossack, who even as a child knew the saddle better than the crib. The gentle movements of the horse beneath him rocked him into sleep more often than his mother’s embrace ever did.  
The young Polish noble just shrugged his shoulders, helplessly.  
“He is just a tad tired, that’s all. When he finally decides to stand up, he will be fine as new.”  
“Are you sure, Laszek? Because I doubt that this horse will ever be able to stand,” stated Bohun ominously, as some kind of dark prophecy.  
How could he even know? There was no reliable source of light except the moon to tell with certainty. All that his human eyes could make out of the situation was, that out of some obscure reason, the animal refused to cooperate with him.  
Maybe Bohun had been blessed with better eyesight. Sometimes it felt like he could stare a hole in his soul, he wouldn’t even be that surprised if turned out that he possess night vision like the creatures of the night.  
When the exhausted beast neighed once again, this time even fainter than before, Bohun covered his horse’s ears so he doesn’t have to listen to the heart-breaking plea.  
Based on his pained face, it seemed like he would rather cover his own ones too.  
The skilled rider quickly jumped down from his saddle and came over to him. But it wasn’t to help the headstrong beast rise up, but to reassure him: “Spokiyno, spokiyno. Myrno. What is your name again, buddy? I didn’t quite catch it.”  
“Sergiusz!” responded Jan from the far back. After all, horses couldn’t talk.  
“And who asked you?” growled Bohun, almost cursing. “Can’t you see that I am talking to our friend here? Saying my greetings as one should when meeting an old acquaintance.”  
Why on earth was Bohun on familiar terms with his stallion? Maybe he really did try to charm him once. That was his downfall – the poor idiot was more talented at handling beasts than women. His order of doing things was completely messed up. He reserved his gentle words for his mares and didn’t leave any for the lassies.  
Jan would be lying if he said that it didn't get on his nerves. “Stop bothering the horse, it won’t betray my secrets.” The mocking tone of his voice was more than apparent.  
Bohun couldn't bear being Jan's laughingstock, he lashed out: “I might not be more than a dirty peasant in your eyes, but unlike you, I can’t bring myself to hurt animals.”  
“Only people,” remarked Jan and chuckled with amusement.  
Bohun awarded him with a feisty look.  
“If you don’t stop laughing, I might miss the horse and aim at your head instead. This poor creature needs to be put out of its misery.”  
Jan protested ardently. “Don’t you dare kill it! That stallion costs a fortune. It is of true Arab descent, the wind and storm can’t match its speed.”  
“It seems like it already did. Based on his soaked back, you rushed him to his early death. He won’t live until morning.”  
Starting then, Bohun spoke in inaudible whispers. Jan was used to hearing him shout, he didn’t know he could be this gentle and… calm.  
The sight of horses dying always saddened him greatly. When they broke out their necks or even limbs, he felt terribly guilty for their suffering. Today was no different, but Bohun’s tender voice put his mind to ease. Not only that, but Bohun’s carefully chosen phrases certainly eased the horse’s passing too.  
Even if Skrzetuski was able to forgive himself for all the pain he caused, Bohun wasn’t so lenient.  
“You son of a bitch, you rushed him to an early death! The poor soul, it trusted you too much. Other horses would have slowed down to catch a breath a long time ago, but based on the sweat on its fur, you never considered slowing down. What was so urgent, ha? What were you plotting? To ambush me?”  
“All alone? Don’t be ridiculous. I just had some pressing matters to discuss with you.”  
“Something that couldn’t wait until morning? Something that couldn’t be conveyed by a letter or an envoy?”  
“Jurko, you can’t be serious. You know well that those kind of things never work out. I am speaking from a personal experience here.”  
“So, horse-murderer, you think that you can disturb my peace and then you can quietly sneak back to the bed warmed by your beloved Helena without any harm? I owe you my life and I despise you for that. Although it is a fact that I never really valued it either, so don’t be surprised if I might not feel the need to repay the debt.”  
“I gave you life and then took it from you. If anything, my life is at your hands, do what you want with it. I came to repent for my sins.”  
This time, Bohun was laughing. And what a terrific laughter it was! It crawled up one’s spine and nested in his ribs, slowly gnawing at his heart. A few laughs like that, and Jan would be eaten whole, his heart and soul included.  
Bohun reprimanded him. “Eyy, Laszek. You are speaking like an old hag at her deathbed. Should I call for a priest?”  
“Take it back, Jurko. Take back the life that I have taken from you, duel with me. Stab me, shoot me, slice me up. Pretend that you have never met me. Let Helena forget, let the whole world forget that Jan Skrzetuski even walked this earth!”  
Bohun wasn’t impressed by his confession.  
“Sufficient blood was spilled tonight. You speak like a drunk and you certainly behave like one. If I wasn’t so mad at you right now, I would come closer to smell your breath.”  
“Jurko, don’t you understand what I say? You can’t take my wife, but you can have my widow. The moment I die, she is yours to claim. Don’t try to take her by force, you know she despises that. Be gentle like you would be to a foal or to a horse with a broken limb. She can’t love all of you, she never will, but you can make her like some parts of you and ignore the rest.”  
“And you? What about you?” inquired Bohun with a raised eyebrow. His suspicions were growing with each word.  
“I die by your hands. I stole so much from you and I made you murder her family.”  
“And yet you ask me to take another life, yours at that! You know well enough that I was a murderer way before killing the Kurcewiczs. Killing is the only thing I am good at. You witnessed it just now. But I won’t kill you. Live on and suffer as I do, that’s what you deserve.”  
“Jurko, I took her from you. You could have been happy, you could have been a family, she could have even bear your child!”  
“If not you, some other Lach might have come around and taken her from me. I was never good enough from the start, from the moment I was born.”  
“Given enough time, she would have changed her mind.”  
Bohun was getting irritated with his false words, with his white lies. “You know how much she despises me and how much she adores you.”  
“I do.”  
“If I take you from her, she will never forgive me.” Bohun’s voice broke as shuttered glass.  
Jan wondered, why killing him would mean such a big deal for the young Cossack, when he has personally stated, that bloodshed was his area of expertise.  
“Then don’t tell her the truth. Say that I have fallen in battle. Let’s make a pact, me and you.”  
“To hell with Helena! Keep the wench to yourself, if you wanted her so badly.”  
“Bohun! Watch your tongue!”  
“If she had wanted me, if she said it by one word – or even one look would be enough, she would be mine, not yours. I would have taken her by force anytime I could feel that she regretted marrying you and that she pines for me. But you make her so happy that she could kiss the ground you walk upon!”  
Jan protested. “I wouldn’t bear the weight of such a deed.”  
“What now, pan Skrzetuski, are you fed up with all the adoration? You don’t realise how fortunate are you.”  
“Helena doesn’t love me, she loves the idea of me. I am the valiant knight, who saved her from her foster family, from war and from…”  
“Me,” finished Bohun, grinning. “Now I see now how I played straight into your cards. The more I wanted her, the more she clang to you. From me she got angry shouts, from you gentle whispers. The more disgusting I seemed to her, the more you shinned. It wasn’t your fault that I lost her, it was mine. And now you say that your death might change something! She would never ever be my wife, it was never meant to be! Not in a thousand years!”  
It was rare to see Bohun so vulnerable. Skrzetuski broke down to his knees, it became impossible to bear the weight of such a genuine confession. Similarly to Atlas, he felt like he was forced to hold up the celestial eternity.  
He wanted to comfort Jurko, in any possible way that he would be capable of, but it would be like a victor comforting the fallen. It would be like laughing in his saddened face…  
But still, he had to try. He couldn’t stand the sight of his former enemy, the one who would hold a szabla even if his arm was broken, suffer such a loss because of one woman.  
“Helena is heartless. She could never return your feelings, because there is something feral in them, something that she can’t understand and that terrifies her. Yes, Bohun, she is scared of you! Even if you promise her that you will never hurt her, she has seen you hurt so many others before her without a second thought. Fuck, she even saw you slice a man to pieces! She can’t comprehend that you could kill all those others, because they weren’t important to you – because they weren’t her. Don’t expect a woman to grasp the sacrifice a soldier has to make. Being a soldier myself, I am not much different from you. I massacred way too many to keep count, there might have been innocent ones amongst them.”  
It physically pained Jan to see the man he cared so much for, this wounded.  
He married a witch, a marble souled queen, who never realised how much she missed out when she condemned this man for his bestial methods. He could have turned out much different, if she didn’t deny him her love.  
If Skrzetuski robbed Jurko of something, Helena took three times as much.  
“You, Janko?” laughed Bohun like a wild beast, with his teeth shining in the moonlight, his canines unnaturally sharp, helping Jan back to his feet, because his kneeling made him feel uncomfortable. “You are Polish gentry, you are nobility itself. If you kill, it is just and for a good reason. If you were a lion, you would hunt only in dire hunger. But me? I am a sinful man and she will never forgive me, she would never pray for my safe return.”  
“Then let her pray for mine and as long as I am alive, I will pray for you.”  
“It is a woman’s job to pray.”  
That single sentence from Bohun aroused many feelings in Skretuski. Yes – aroused. That was just the right word for another activity that Bohun did really well.  
Many hopes he had hidden away from the world and foremost – from Bohun. It was high time to come clean.  
“Sometimes I wish I were born a woman. Only then I could give you what you seek. You deserve someone to love you back. I wouldn’t be like Helena, I don’t know how she managed to hold back.”  
“Then do it,” said Bohun, as if it was the simplest thing in the world.  
“Do what?”  
“Pray for me. Give me what I want. Stop holding back.”  
“Jurko, I can’t quite understand what you mean.”  
And truly, he was quite puzzled. He tried to repress those feelings the best that he could. He didn’t think of them as of dirty, but the world might – Bohun might…  
There were various rumours about men who left their wives to lie in bed with other men. The war is long and men are separated from their spouses for too long, sometimes they get weird cravings in camps.  
Some never quite recover.  
“You do understand what I mean, maybe even a bit too well. You are as twisted as me due to endless yearning. You can’t conceive a child with Helena, you can’t even kiss her on the lips. But I bet if I took you into my hands, you would be rock hard.”  
“Jurko! You don’t mean what you say. Helena would die with grief, from the shame!”  
“To hell with Helena. I want to gift her with the same pain that she has caused me. Let her love someone who’ll never love back. Maybe it is divine punishment for her wrongdoings. Hers and yours.”  
“No. I wouldn’t call it a punishment.”  
“Are you sure Laszek? You would become a laughing stock. A man who left his pretty little wife to be with a dirty Cossack, to make love to him, like those randy dogs we shoot because they are unfit for the hunt.”  
Jan looked back at this deeply scarred man, puzzled. Did he not… is there a possibility that he didn’t know? If not, he had to enlighten him.  
“Being with you isn’t a punishment, Jurko. Living in a loveless marriage for two years is. To become the sole reason of your unhappiness is my misery. To catch your sharp eyes searching for Helena in the crowd. Being unable to make you feel pleasure, to you, who have never lied with a man or a woman, being unable to teach you how to kiss and how to…”  
But he didn’t get to finish his confession.  
Jurko was a spectacular pupil. He didn’t wait for his teacher to show him examples, he jumped into action first. He learnt by doing.  
Even if it was clumsy and full of mistakes, too wet and too rough, he did the assigned tasks eagerly, without batting an eye.  
“Don’t you dare teach me, what you have learnt with other women!” exclaimed Bohun.  
His tongue was so eager, that it didn’t take long for Jan to feel it down his throat – a shiver running down his spine – a wet lick caressing his now undressed torso – and his full mouth circulating around the tip of his…  
But still, it was as if they were in the middle of battle field! The corpse of the animal lied only a small distance away, the vastness of the steppe around them, above the stars, below the hard ground. It was quite cold too, because his pure, innocent lover probably didn’t grasp yet, that in order to make love, the partners don’t have to be completely exposed.  
Nonetheless, he didn’t care, couldn’t care! Let him tear his expensive clothes as if they were rags, if that’s what makes him happy. He would never let this golden opportunity slip. Good thing the other man was holding him so tightly in his embrace, otherwise the whole world might have fallen to pieces.  
Bohun’s sharp canines left various marks over his body. Bite marks, bruise marks, nail marks, kiss marks – they all caused him unexplainable sense of pleasure. How only could that love sick idiot with poor self-esteem call it Jan’s punishment? If anything, he would ask him to go harder, although it was totally pointless.  
Bohun was deaf to his instructions. The late bloomer selfishly got lost in his own world of pleasure.  
Women were never so aggressive. Similarly to the logs in the forest, they just lied there, waiting for him to do his job.  
Jurko didn’t wait for anything. Starting other things before even finish the previous ones, was a sign of his grand impatience. Well, he certainly knew how to keep Jan gasping for a breath. Good thing that he was man of strong built to withstand Bohun’s vigorous advances.  
In life of any man, no matter how wild and untamed, the greatest reward is to love and to be loved back in return. Bohun was experiencing it only now, after a long period of denial – he felt too much at once, he couldn't handle his sudden outbursts of passion.  
Skrzetuski’s love was a heavy burden, but at the same time, it felt as if someone adjusted husaria wings to the saddle of his horse. He was worried he might sour up and fly.  
“Mine! Mine, all mine!” muttered Bohun in ecstasy. It was incredible that he didn’t have to force this love, to demand it by violence, it was all his, maybe for a much longer time than they both realised.  
“Yours for the taking,” reassured him Jan, nodding. Bohun’s hands were quick to serve as a support for his head.  
“Don’t you dare hit your head on the hardened ground, reckless Lach.”  
Using the brief moment where Bohun’s attention was focused on his words, not his body, he tried to lecture him once more: “If you want the marks to last longer, you don’t bite, you suck. Here, let me show you…”  
But his offer was rejected again. Bohun wouldn’t free him from his grip, if something, he was holding him ever tighter.  
Lying on the ground, his hands pinned down, Jurko – true to the rumours about him, bite into his neck like a starved strzygoń. It was no novelty that his heart was beating like crazy around his rival, but never before did he realise that even his neck veins responded to his presence. The wild Cossack certainly knew how to stimulate every fiber of his being.  
It was only then when Jan started having serious doubts about Jurko’s inexperience.  
His jealousy was so unbearable, he had to inquire: “Who taught you all of this?”  
Bohun just murmured something, but he wouldn’t accept that as an answer.  
“Was it Helena?”  
He suspected that his wife might be just as weak to temptation as he was. After all, who in their right mind wouldn’t be? Even if he had married her as a virgin, she might have used her mouth or her hands...  
Although it physically pained Jan to disturb Jurko in action (he could be doing much better things with his mouth than speaking), he had to know it! He had to know his rival’s name! He pushed his head off to stop him from sucking.  
“Jan, are you serious? I almost finished you off. Helena? You know her the best, she would rather commit suicide than to lie with me. As I said, I learnt from books.”  
“Don’t lie, I know your secret, I know you don’t know how to read. Who taught you?” he demanded again in despair.  
Bohun just laughed.  
It was a pleasant surprise for him not to be the envious one this time. The day came when someone finally cared about him just enough so that they would get jealous.  
If anything, he was accustomed to jealousy – not too long ago, he considered jealousy the most profound form of love.  
Not anymore. Not after he discovered how well his forehead fits into the crook of his lover’s neck, how warm his breath is, how nice it feels to be joined inside him, to hold his hand. Jealousy was nothing compared to the feeling of fulfilment that he got to experience now.  
The whole steppe echoed with his laughter. It was terrific.  
“You poor spiteful soul, illustrations exist. And I am a man too. Even the clumsiest of men realise sooner or later, that some movements simply feel good. Like this one.”  
And he grabbed Jan once again in the place where he foretold that he will be hard at the mere sight of him. Moving the skin back and forth, first gently and then violently, he quickly made the Polish noble forget about all of his worries, guilt and…  
“Ahh,” he let out a frustrated sight.  
“Bear with me even if it hurts, don’t you dare go back to Helena,” cried Bohun. “Because if you do… because if you pick her over me… I might truly kill you. Don’t ever leave me!” he begged.  
“As if I ever could,” whispered Jan, caressing his dark face, wiping away his lover’s tears with a swift movement of his thumb.  
Irritated, he realised if it were Bohun, he might have licked it off instead.  
“That bastard is too experienced for his own good. And I looked so much forward to teaching him! He seems to know almost everything by now even without my help.”  
Poor Jan didn’t know, that ever since meeting their first meeting in Rozlogi, Bohun carefully prepared for him. Each night he clumsily studied his own male body, so if the right time comes, he can bring Jan the greatest pleasure.  
He knew he had to. Since Jan kicked his horse among the ribs, its painful cry warned Bohun of his incoming fate. Horses crying were as symbolic for him as were rooster’s cries for Apostle Peter.  
Yet even the wildest and happiest of his dreams didn’t convey the sheer euphoria of this moment.  
It was just as Horpyna foretold, ever better!  
***  
“Horpyna, tell me, will Helenka ever love me?”  
“The religious noble blood? Not a chance. The lass is too pure and proud for you,” laughed the witch.  
How dare she mock his hunger for love! Like a malnourished snake, he might start digesting his own heart soon enough, for his starvation for touch was deepening with anticipation.  
If not Helena, then who? If not now, then when?  
His misery was so grand, that even the heartless witch took pity on him.  
“Don’t you rush it, young falcon! You will be loved way too much for your own good. I can see him. He will come into your life – not as one comes to visit... but as one comes to kingdom where all the rivers have been waiting for his handsome reflection, all the roads, for his uncertain steps, all the steppes, for the cries of his dying stallion...“

Bonus

„How could you only hear the cries of my horse in the middle of the night? And how the hell did you know that it was time for it to die?“ questioned him Jan.  
„That’s what you would like to know, Laszek! Your pretentious cavalry has no common sense when it comes to handling horses. That’s why they are unable to ride on the wet soil after heavy rain, toppling over like a house of cards, stumbling like village drunks. We Cossacks can’t stand the sound of the poor beasts being mistreated, that’s what called me to you from afar.”  
But he was lying – even if the horse wasn’t already dying, he would take its life himself.  
Something felt terribly wrong about this kind, gallant beast dying simply for the sake of fulfilling a prophecy, but it was a small price to pay for love.  
He would readily give much more if asked. Tenfold. Hundredfold.  
When the steppes finally echoed with the cry of Jan’s dying stallion, he knew that he must go. Rushing his beloved black mare, he felt as if he has sprout his own pair of husaria wings, becoming one with those he once despised.  
He almost broke his own horse’s neck in his desperate attempt to see Jan once again.  
After Jan’s buddies murdered Horpyna and took the girl with them, he felt robbed of all hope. He figured that where Helena is, there will be Jan eventually. That sooner or later they will be bound by fate to meet again.  
When they took the girl, they stole his trump card to Jan’s heart – Skrzetuski marrying the wench burn it to ashes.  
Growing insane with pain, he was certain that he will never get to see Jan again - not up close. He wanted to dig a hole in his chest with his own nails, to rip his heart out, toss it to starved mongrels and wolves, because at least they could put it into good use, if he never did. What was the purpose of a heart that was acustomed to loving, but never got the favor returned? Was he put into this world only to experience suffering without a hope for better days? It was too cruel.  
Still, fate works in mysterious ways. They captured him and brought him before Jan, as a gift.  
With a rope tightened around his neck, he was resolved to die. Dying by Jan’s hands seemed more inviting than living on without their touch. Bearing all this agony and longing all over again would definitely take its toll on his sanity and he didn’t have much of it for starters.  
Instead Jan calmly took his dainty, feminine wrists in his big hands and caressed them lovingly with his thumb. Then, in spite of what his servants and his wife wanted, Skrzetuski cut his ropes, set him free.  
Before leaving, Bohun had forced himself to look back at Helena, as if to checks if she has witnessed with her eyes what he has felt with his whole being – Jan’s loving gaze, directed at him instead of her.  
She must have seen. Only that would explain her angelic face twisted by pain. All the turmoil and suffering have taken their toll on her. Similarly to a piece of silk losing its vibrant colour in direct sunlight, the girl’s beauty was already starting to fade away – while Jan’s beauty was everlasting, bright as the sun itself.  
Finally Jurko could have smiled at Helena victoriously.  
Serves her right. The maiden might have won the battle, but he aimed even higher.  
“Small battle, small glory. Big battle, big glory.”  
Jan's pitying gaze with a slight hint of jealousy in it was the greatest reward. It was blinding him like rays of sun tend to do at noon – Bohun didn’t even need to turn his face to see it. From the penetrating look of his beloved, he couldn’t have escaped even if he shut his eyes, even if he were blind. Riding off into the sunset he felt it scorching on his back, piercing holes through his chest.  
And he was grateful for it – treasured the memory of it for the cold, lonely nights, when the fire and cloaks weren’t sufficient enough to keep him warm. One look from Skrzetuski made his blood boil more than any girl’s embrace ever could!  
The fire in Jan’s eyes kept him hopeful for better times. They had asked him to stay, even if his slightly parted lips couldn’t – not until tonight at least.  
Unhinged happiness couldn’t come until the beast let out its last breath.  
He had to sacrifice it… he had to… even if he loved animals for their innocence and purity. Killing them felt bigger of a sin than stabbing a man thirty times.  
To distract him from sadness, Jan did what horses do, what dogs do… he licked his tears? It was so ridiculous, that it made him want to cry all the more, but this time with joy.  
“What did you whisper to my horse in his last moments?” enquired Jan, when he saw that his method failed.  
Bohun shrugged his shoulders. “That’s a secret that the poor devil will take to his grave.”  
It was too childish, he couldn’t share it with Jan. But he meant every word he has said: “Thank you for bringing your master to me.”  
Helena misjudged him when she claimed him to be a pagan that never prays, because all of his miserable life he has prayed and yearned for this precious moment – to find someone willing enough to return his kisses, without shying away from his touch, without growing disgusted by him!  
Maybe not with psalms, as other people tend to do pray, but with desperate actions, by pleads for help that never got even heard out, let alone answered.  
Later on, when he was brave enough, he prayed for Jan. True to the saying that sinners make the best saints, he spent his every spare minute begging the heavens – this time properly as a monk, in deep silence, kneeling, hands clasped.  
He couldn’t ask for Jan to return his feelings, because that was too much to want.  
Still, he could plead to the Lord to guide him, to keep him safe from swords, arrows and fire. And most of all – to keep him safe from himself.  
How grateful he was that his prayers never got heard out – and maybe they did, they just eventually cancelled out. After all, in order for him to be loved, the gentle nobleman was a necessity, his presence in the young Cossack’s life was inevitable.  
And perhaps Skrzetuski prayed so loudly for both of them, that the sound of his pleads has drowned out his. Afterall, Jan hinted that he included his beloved’s name in his evening prayers.  
Yes, that seemed perfectly reasonable – if Bohun had the right to choose, he would make sure to tend to Jan’s wishes first and only after fulfilling them, could he mind his own wants. It was only natural that even the angels in heaven favoured him.


End file.
